


Sleeping Dogs

by blazichu



Category: Ghost - Mystery Skulls (Music Video), Mystery Skulls (Band)
Genre: Gen, Post-Cave, Psychic!Lewis
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2016-11-30
Packaged: 2018-03-30 12:15:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3936418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blazichu/pseuds/blazichu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Ebner Facility was a fascinating place; with no online presence or visible purpose, nobody was entirely sure why it existed or why it had been abandoned. For Vivi, the best part was sheer number of paranormal encounters reported at the site, and for awhile, nobody had any problem with it being their next investigation.</p><p>That didn't last long.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The first day of fourth grade, Arthur stood by, terrified, while one of his classmates fell into a panic attack.

It wasn’t something he remembered with any amount of clarity; the details were fuzzy and it was the aftermath that he’d return to years after the fact. He remembered how the boy secluded himself in a corner, flinching back from anyone who approached and how he trembled under his father’s protective arm as they left the classroom.

Their teacher tried valiantly to reign her students in, but could never silence the rumblings that ran through the class and radiated outwards to the rest of the school. Administration remained tight-lipped on the matter but the sheer number of authority figures involved drove the rumor mill wild.

It came as no surprise when this particular classmate was kept from school the next few days, and that, when he finally _did_ return, he was alternately pestered for information and then ignored in the same breath.

It was the first time Arthur had seen a person treated as a novelty.

He hadn’t possessed the same sense of morbid curiosity that enthralled his peers, and actively shied away from the entire mess; he’d been near enough to see the unbridled panic as it unfolded and to recognize the reality of the situation. There was a person at the heart of the story and not just an unfeeling character– so he ignored the gossip and went out of his way to avoid the drama that certain parts of the class started. He wouldn’t want to be bothered after all that, so why should anyone else impose themselves on their classmate?

In later years, he’d realize that was exactly what set him on his current path; it was this refusal to participate in badgering his classmate that landed him a spot at the back of the classroom, table partners with taciturn Lewis Pepper.

Arthur honestly hadn’t minded; it got him out of sharing a space with a girl he’d known from the previous year, whose supplies always seemed to wind up on his side of the table. The only downside was that sitting next to the object of recent gossip meant he was pestered for information too. Doing his best impression of Uncle Lance and telling the other kids to get lost worked about half of the time, but it was beginning to earn him a weird reputation, and he didn’t know what to make of that.

It _did_ reward him with an appreciative smile and quiet “Thank you” when Lewis caught on, which, Arthur decided, was worth it.

While the panic attacks grew less and less frequent as years went by and the boy who accidentally shook up the entire school grew past his reputation, Arthur wouldn’t forget either of them.

And that was why alarm bells started ringing in his head as they approached the site of their next investigation.

As much as Lewis himself had changed, the look of muted horror hadn’t.

Arthur shifted in his seat, angling himself away from Vivi and Mystery in favor of the ghost who was, more or less, draped over his shoulder to stare out the passenger-side window. “Lew? Everything okay?”

Wearily and without diverting his attention, Lewis inclined his head. After a moment, his expression softened and he tried for an uneasy smile.

“Don’t worry about it.” He murmured back. Internally, Arthur scoffed, but didn’t dare vocalize his disbelief for fear of being shut out. “I just… think it would be good to hear what Mystery thinks of this one before we get started.”

“You think there’s something to it? A ghost hanging around or something?”

“It’s not that as much as–” Lewis trailed off, turning his attention back out the window. Though he was watching something outside, his reflection stared dully past Arthur, betraying the uncertainty written across his face. “There’s something about this place that feels wrong.”

Arthur frowned at the glass and considered that for half a second– then, glaring pointedly at the back of his friend’s head, drawled, “Hey Vivi, maybe this isn’t such a great idea.”

“Arthur!” Lewis squeaked, scandalized, as he whirled around to face the blonde’s frown head-on.

At the same time, the van’s engine revved, reminding both of the boys why Vivi didn’t usually drive.

“Whadda you mean?” She asked, enthusiasm not dimmed in the slightest. “The Ebner facility has been on my list for years! It’s not like we’ve got any cases to work on, so we need something to keep busy with.”

Arthur rolled his eyes, and, if he weren’t so worried, would have smiled. “You mean like our _jobs_?”

To everyone’s relief, she didn’t look away from the road as she flapped a hand dismissively in his direction. “I mean something challenging.”

Though halfway tempted to reply that she’d never worked for Lance, he decided against pursuing that line of thought. Instead, he tilted his head back so he looked at Lewis upside-down and hissed, “If you’re so worried, _say something to her._ ”

“I’m not w– it’s just a silly feeling. It’s not worth disappointing her.”

He made a strangled sound in the back of his throat. “Pushover.”

Based solely on the look on Lewis was giving him, Arthur fully expected their conversation to devolve into a schoolyard back-and-forth of “am not” and “are too”, and was a little disappointed when it didn’t.

It still got them scolded. By Mystery.

Anticipating the verbal blow that was sure to come, Arthur winced.

“Behave, children.” The dog purred, eyes narrowed slyly, “Whether or not the old ‘don’t make me turn this van around’ argument applies in its original form, I’m sure we can change it accordingly.”

In a clear threat, Vivi pressed down harder on the gas, grinning from ear to ear.

“Somethin’ wrong boys?”

“No.” They said in unison, disagreement temporarily forgotten in the face of such danger.

By the time Arthur remembered that he was supposed to be irritated with Lewis, they were already parked at the edge of an open field and Vivi was laying out a plan– in the loosest sense of the word– for everyone.

“So this place has racked up dozens of reports of poltergeist activity– mostly by 'irresponsible’ and 'untrustworthy’ teenage witnesses.”

Despite his annoyance with the ghost, Arthur and Lewis exchanged a knowing look over her head. 'Irresponsible and untrustworthy teenage witnesses’ meant 'teenage vandals’ to most of the world– just not to Vivi. Blissfully ignorant of the communication going on behind her back, she continued ever onwards.

“It’s only two stories and the floor plans were available online, so it’ll be a cinch to get around in. We just head in and see what we can flush out! Shouldn’t be that hard when we have Mystery and Lew on our side.” She reached this conclusion with a brilliant smile playing over her face, and it didn’t take Arthur any time at all to realize that nobody was going to raise any objections to the plan, no matter how justified.

Well fine. If that was the way they wanted to play, he could work with it.

“Why don’t you go with Mystery, Vivi?”

She shot him a dry look. “So you and Lewis can keep arguing? I don’t think so, bub.”

“We won’t argue!” Arthur complained, coming dangerously close to whining. Off to his side, Mystery snorted.

“Of course you won’t. I mean, just look you right now– so mature and grown up! Wow!” He wasn’t entirely sure why she decided to punctuate the heavy sarcasm with jazz hands, but let it slide for fear of _actually_ getting on her nerves. She scoffed and folded her arms over her chest.

“Let them.” Mystery put in, head cocked and with an expression that promised mischief. “I certainly don’t want to hear about this dispute the entire time we’re investigating. Let them work it out for themselves; it’s a skill they’ll have to learn someday.”

Lewis groaned. “Please stop acting like we’re kids.”

“Oh, but you are.”

Vivi rolled her eyes and decided not to argue against any of it.

“Okay, fine. So Arthur and Lewis’ll go upstairs–” She stopped as the ghost in question tossed his hands up in the air theatrically. “Oh hush, you can’t die twice. You guys check things out upstairs while Mystery and I investigate the main floor. If you really want to get this over with, I suggest you both get your butts in gear.”

Without another glance in their direction, she marched off through the grass towards the lone structure in the distance. Mystery afforded the both of them a canine grin and trotted after her.

Just as well, because there was something Arthur wanted to get out of the way before the 'fun’ began.

“Seriously Lew, what’s wrong? The last time you looked that freaked out was when we got trapped on the roof of that high-rise hotel.” He grimaced at the memory. Arthur was no fan of heights, but even Vivi had been forced to admit that the drop was staggering; Lewis, with his death-granted acrophobia, had been a complete wreck. It made Vivi question what _exactly_ it took to psyche a ghost out of using their (super)natural abilities, but nobody was inclined to investigate the matter any further.

“I– I don’t know. It just feels like we shouldn’t be here.”

“Listen, man; I love you, I really do, but you have _got_ to start speaking up about these things. If it feels like we shouldn’t be here, _why are we still here?_ What happened to asking what Mystery thought before we headed in? I know you didn’t want to disappoint Vivi, but isn’t that better than taking a stupid risk?”

“It’s not that easy, Arthur. If there _is_ something here, it’s not powerful enough to be a threat– there’s no reason not to take a look around. I’m probably just being paranoid.”

“Okay, one, that’s my job. Two, maybe it’s not anything alive or undead, maybe the land’s cursed or some shit. Magic never makes sense. Three, there _is_ a reason not to look around: you. _You deserve to opt out if something makes you uncomfortable_.”

Lewis huffed in annoyance and looked away, muttering about hypocrisy under his breath. After a second, Arthur followed his gaze and realized that Vivi was just a speck in the distance. Hoo boy…

“It’s too late now.” The ghost reasoned, “We’ll just go in, look around and get out. If there's a poltergeist, then we take care of it and then leave. If the property is cursed,” He paused and sent Arthur a sideways look, biting down on the hint of a smile, “We give up and go home no matter what Vivi says. You’re right, magic doesn’t make sense.”

“Oh sure, _that’s_ what I’m right about. C'mon, throw me a bone here, man.” The instant it left his lips, Arthur knew he’d regret using that particular idiom.

Sure enough, when he turned back to his investigative partner, he found a seven foot tall skeleton leaning over him.

“Smartass.” He grumbled, turning on his heel and leading the way through the waist-high grass.

A rumble of laughter sounded from close behind him and, for a second, it felt like things might actually work out in their favor this time.


	2. Chapter 2

When she and Mystery approached the Ebner facility's threshold, Vivi finally turned to see what kind of progress the boys were making.

She was unsurprised to find them clear across the field, but, at least, nobody's body language seemed to suggest any continuing conflict. The fact that Lewis had found it appropriate to switch to his _oh-so-intimidating_ skeletal projection was puzzling, but, for the time being, she decided not to question it. Things were usually better that way.

Demon dog? Just go with it. Friend rising from the dead? No use arguing. Surf's up surprise pizza? Didn't even want to know.

Her friends afforded her the same luxury, so who was she to complain?

When she turned away, Arthur was swatting at the air above his shoulder, shooing off a Deadbeat.

They were _finally_ at the Ebner facility. She hadn't been lying when she said it had been on her list of paranormal locales for years. It was one of those places that was close enough to be tempting but too far away to drop in on a whim-- and if they were going to the effort to get there, Vivi wanted enough time inside to make it worth the drive. In short, the place had 'day-trip' written all over it.

Well, not literally, but she wasn't entirely sure what the graffiti littering the outer walls actually said.

The latest reports from the property were likely the result of a low-level spirit, easily shooed out or dismissed entirely, but stories had been pouring in for years. People claimed to have seen objects fly across a room or sparks light up in thin air; sometimes they heard things that even recording equipment couldn't pick up. Even if it wasn't a ghost, there was definitely something strange about the place, and it had been teasing Vivi ever since she found out about it back in high school.

She was just so _ecstatic_ that she was finally getting to check it out first-hand; virtual floor plans and photos weren't anywhere close to the real deal.

At one point, the back door might have been locked, but the tumbler had rusted away into something unrecognizable and the deadbolt had been forcefully removed, currently laying, useless, inside the doorway. In one hand, Vivi clicked her flashlight on and off, channeling some small amount of her restless excitement as she reached for the doorknob.

The hinges creaked in protest as she tested it, but didn't offer any physical resistance. The door swung open.

It was the scent of decay that reached her first, sickly sweet, settling in her lungs like heavy pollen. She coughed into her elbow as Mystery sneezed several times in rapid succession.

That put a bit of a damper on this whole excursion. Distantly, Vivi made a mental note to update their gear with some manner of face mask for everyone whose lungs were at risk; she wasn't sure how they'd manage that for Mystery-- or if he'd even need one-- but vowed to tackle that problem at a later date.

Stubbornly, she raised her head from her sweater and took a deep breath before stepping foot inside.

The high windows provided some small amount of light as she made her way deeper inside, toeing at bits of rubble, but she held her flashlight at the ready. She eyed the staircase as they made their way past it, taking note of the missing portions of railing and broken steps; neither of these factors would deter a human explorer, but she doubted Mystery would have been able to make his way up them normally.

She hummed to herself, thoughtful as they passed it by, into the next room, and clicked the light on.

There were loose sheets of paper everywhere, torn, creased and warped with age, ripped from wherever they'd started by an unknown force. Toppled desks lay on their sides, drawers flung haphazardly across the room with their contents spilled from corner to corner. One panel hung from above, revealing a drop ceiling.

It screamed 'office building', which, honestly, wasn't something Vivi had expected.

Sure, she'd done her research on the place, but had never turned up anything about what it had housed prior to falling into disuse. It wasn't a business-- or, if it was, it was so private that there wasn't any information about it floating around, even on the internet. Technically, they didn't even have a title for it; 'Ebner' was just the name of the road it connected to.

Those were all small parts of what made it so intriguing.

She heard a muffled back-and-forth from the next room over and then the wooden steps groaning under pressure. It stopped as Arthur said something, and it was only due to the ethereal nature of Lewis's voice that his response reached Vivi.

"And who, exactly, is afraid of heights here?"

She rolled her eyes and knelt down so she could inspect a pair of prongs that protruded from low on the wall. It looked a little like someone had gotten an outlet and plug-in mixed up, and she was hard-pressed to figure out what purpose it could possibly serve.

Mystery stared at it as she rose to her feet and dusted her skirt off, only trotting after her when she made to check the next room. That was how they uncovered what used to be a meeting room, a break room, kitchen, what might have been another office, and a waiting room.

The front door's lock was still intact, Vivi noticed, and in this one room, they'd done away with the high windows, favoring standard ones. Tall grass wrapped around the edges of a gravel parking lot, though weeds had made their way through the rock. It was pretty in an eerie sort of way, which was exactly what Vivi lived for, but it wasn't why she was there.

She puffed her cheeks up and wondered if the boys were having any better luck upstairs.

"Getting impatient are we?"

Her gaze dropped down to Mystery's height and she pursed her lips. " _No_. I was just thinking."

"About?"

"…stuff."

He hummed in acknowledgment and began to trot off the way they'd come-- slowly, at first, then at a more regular pace when she followed, finally stopping in front of the reverse-plug-in. "Would 'stuff' include this peculiar installation?"

"Now it does." She shrugged off the look it earned her and considered it more carefully.

At first, she'd assumed it was some archaic technology that might have been commonplace in older businesses, but that was seeming less and less plausible the more she thought about it. The fact that Mystery had picked it out of everything they'd seen thus far only supported the line of thinking.

Bracing both hands against the wall above it, Vivi gave an experimental shove and, when that failed, pressed an ear to it and knocked-- but, before she could compare it to another section, her gaze was drawn to another anomaly, this time hidden behind the half-rotten bookshelf. She followed it to where a crack in the ceiling ran down to meet it, then wedged a shoe between the wall and the shelf; it trembled dangerously before she applied any force, and immediately collapsed when she did.

There was a commotion upstairs, and she was hardly surprised when wispy pink ghost poked through the ceiling and leveled a worried look her way.

Vivi fondly waved it off. "We're good, it was just this hunk of junk. Might wanna go report to your _big scary boss_ before he gets any ideas."

The Deadbeat made a mournful noise, which she'd long since realized was just the way they sounded, and drifted back upwards, leaving her to the giant split in the wall.

The giant split which, she couldn't help but notice, only cracked after reaching the six foot mark.

Door height.

She snorted and shot Mystery a look. "Suuuubtle."

"Incredibly so."

He stepped forward and pawed at the base, where it widened into an actual gap, trying to wedge it open.

"Too bad about those opposable thumbs you don't have."

Mystery gave a stubborn grunt and pointedly ignored the jab.

"Man, can't imagine what that'd be like."

His tail twitched irritably and ears began to flatten.

"If only someone could just _grip_ it, you know? That would be so much easier."

He stopped suddenly and, in one sudden movement, turned a glare on his owner. "Are you trying to tell me something?"

"Yeah, I'm saying scooch, pooch." With a breezy smile, Vivi used a hip to bump him back and knelt at the gap's level. While immovable to those without thumbs, it was easy for her to work her fingers through so she could get a grip on the panel; it must have been as decayed as everything else in the building, because it only took one good yank before it gave way, retreating into the opposite side of the wall.

"Aw yeah, now we're getting somewhere."


	3. Chapter 3

As they stepped down into the darkness, the door tried to slide shut-- but, whether it was due to age or shoddy mechanics, it got caught and stopped with a third of the distance to go. Vivi paused long enough to give it a shake and, confident that it wasn't about to close up any time soon, shone the beam of her flashlight down the stairs.

There wasn't as much debris littering the floor down here; the hidden door had likely protected the area from the elements and unauthorized explorers, minimizing the amount of damage either could do. That wasn't to say that it was clean in any sense of the word, though. Dust and shreds of paper piled up at the bottom of the stairs and intermittently down what she could see of the hallway; the ceiling was low where she stood and sloped downwards, making it difficult to get a good view of the area from the landing.

Based on where the floor was, this path had to lead below ground. Bad omen? Maybe. A paranormalist's dream? Definitely. Mystery hadn't warned her away yet, so Vivi counted that as permission to go ahead and investigate.

She took the stairs two at a time and leapt over the pile of grime at the bottom; though the sudden drop in temperature could be chalked up to the shift from above to below ground, she had high hopes for this secret basement and scurried down the narrow hallway.

It opened up at the corridor's end, like a subterranean cul-de-sac, but it was hard to say what the room could possibly have been; it was in such disarray that even recognizable objects-- like the dozen folding chairs-- were hard to pick out of the chaos. This was clearly the epicenter that the trail of paper scraps had been torn from, which was to say nothing of the jumble of broken parts, and even dirt that spilled in from a hole in the wall.

Vivi didn't consider herself squeamish, but something about the sight seemed unnaturally _filthy_. If there was a way to put off wading through the sea of junk, she'd take it-- which was why she turned her attention to one of the two doors standing guard on either side of the hallway.

One had fallen off its hinges and landed in the room itself. The other-- crooked, but upright-- swayed with even the slightest bit of encouragement. Both had beaten-up chalkboards nailed into them but, otherwise, seemed normal enough.

Upon stepping through the first doorway-- on top of its door-- Vivi's first thought was that someone had taken up residence here at some point. The cot shoved haphazardly against the far wall was old and caked in dust, so it couldn't have been recently. Maybe the original owner had meant it to be a fallout shelter of some sort. She took stock of the rest of the room-- no wider than the cot itself and not much longer-- before turning to inspect its sister space.

It was largely the same: same cot in the same place, same worn blankets, same flimsy bedside table-- broken, this time, against one of the walls.

Neither of the chalkboards offered any further clues, long since wiped clean.

When she looked over to see if Mystery had any ideas, Vivi found the space he'd previously occupied empty. While she wouldn't say she'd _panicked_ in that half-second, it would have been hard to deny if anyone had seen her. The last time she'd turned around, expecting to see him behind her only to find that she was alone…

Maybe she'd been a little callous in sending the boys upstairs.

Something in the main room crunched, drawing her attention, and there was Mystery, smack in the middle of it all, neck deep in garbage.

Cringing, she whispered, "Ew" to herself.

One of the dog's ears perked and he snorted. "Channeling Lewis now, are we? I had no idea you possessed an interest in mediumship." He paused, considering this. "In performing it yourself, at any rate. I believe the entire township is aware of your general interests."

"Yeah, whatever. Are you sure you should be wading around in that stuff? I'm not supernatural or anything, but I _am_ getting some really gross vibes from it."

Mystery's head bobbed in the sea of trash and, before disappearing underneath it, he said, "Well, you should be."

"Really? You're just gonna leave me with _that_?"

She huffed in annoyance and picked a careful path around the room's perimeter, watching for any mobile garbage that might show her where Mystery was. At each doorway she paused, looked inside the room it led to, and found the same thing as before. There were subtle differences to each-- one had scorch marks covering the walls and another was decorated with meticulously spaced holes gouged into the concrete. Most had something broken somewhere inside, but the doors had fared better than the ones closer to the exit.

In one, she found a damaged-- but ultimately intact-- copy of Aesop's Fables. Unlike the mound in the main room's center, it didn't feel dirty-- that wasn't to say there was no atmosphere about it, but nothing warded her off as she made to pick it up and flip through it.

As she stepped out of the sub-room and looked up, she caught movement out of the corner of her eye, flitting back behind a door.

Vivi frowned and only made a cursory inspection of the next few rooms, eager to reach the room labeled '14'-- an outlier, as each of the others had been systematically erased.

Whatever her expectations, she didn't find anything different about room 14. She'd thought that, maybe, there would be some other token in it, but it was barren of anything more than the standard cot-and-nightstand fare. It was horribly, horribly dusty, but everything seemed intact; there wasn’t any damage to the walls or furnishings.

Her brows knit together as she considered that.

Compared to the other rooms, it was in perfect condition-- spared the passage of time, save for the ridiculously thick coating of dust. Vivi hesitated to venture into the room because of it, but, like the book, it lacked the filthy aura common in the basement.

In a moment of inspiration, she set the book on the bedside table.

It wavered under the new weight, but, aside from applying a layer of dust to the book's back cover, did nothing.

She caught herself in the middle of a defeated sigh and stopped before she could stir up the allergy attack laying in wait. Book back in hand, she went back to checking the last few rooms and, eventually, idled in the hallway up to ground level.

Mystery was still snuffling around in the garbage pit, though drawing increasingly closer, and Vivi began to tally up her findings as something dawned on her.

The room she'd seen movement in was labeled '14', but there were only nine of the spartan dormitories.

"Nothing." Mystery announced as he _finally_ emerged, bits of debris clinging stubbornly to his fur. He shook himself off to be rid of it, though his fur remained discolored. As he caught sight of Vivi and her finding, his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "That's interesting, the book doesn't have a ward. Where did it come from?"

"Nuh uh, you first Mr. Peabody. 'Ward'? Was that why all this stuff feels so _nasty_?"

"Essentially. It's not a malevolent energy per se, but certainly one that doesn't want to be disturbed; so long as it gets the desired result, spirits don't tend to be picky about the aura they exude." He rolled his eyes. "Fear is a popular one, though-- and I'm sure I don't need to tell you why. Now if you would?"

Vivi shrugged and pointed across the room, "Found it over there. The little dorm over that way-- 14-- felt the same, but nothing happened when I returned it."

He followed her gaze and sighed. "Well it must have some purpose. Elsewhere, perhaps? In any case, it couldn't hurt to regroup with Arthur and Lewis-- they might have found something that factors into this."

"Eh, better than hanging around down here. I hate to say it, but this has been a major letdown so far."

With an undeniable slump to her shoulders, Vivi made to follow after Mystery, but both stopped in their tracks as a warbling voice groaned out:

_"Give… it… back…"_


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a quick note-- this part of the story was written prior to the full reveal of Belle, Cayenne and Paprika. As of adding this, I don't intend to update this chapter to mesh with canon.

Midway through his stint as a fifth grader, Lewis managed to pick up the seasonal bug that had been going around the school. Not to point any fingers, but the fact that Arthur had gone home sick two days prior was hard to ignore.

His mother scolded him when she realized that he'd been trying to tough it out, and took it as an opportunity to teach him and his sisters one of the rules of working in food service. For those few minutes, it had looked like he was going to get off the hook, but Carolina Pepper never forgot when her kids misbehaved. As soon as the sudden lesson had come to an end, she ushered him to bed and got everybody else back on track, getting ready for the day.

The rest of that day was a haze of general illness-- it was the next that raised questions even a decade wouldn't see the answers to.

Weekends were usually when Lewis had to play babysitter, even though his youngest sister, Pasilla, was the only one who really needed it. In light of recent events (and, technically, being the eldest) Melrose had taken up the slack that Saturday-- a badge which she wore proudly and incessantly shoved in Cascabella's face.

The deal had been that, so long as he rested, Lewis didn't have to suffer exile to his bedroom; he would be allowed to stay in the living room and derive whatever entertainment his sisters provided. In return, it offered a different vantage point of Melrose's rein, discouraging her from using 'I'm in charge' to harass the others. Just in case, Carolina had warned, she'd be coming back around lunchtime to check in with everybody.

And, up until then, the day went fairly well. There were only two arguments-- both diffused by the miserable moan that followed the raised voices-- one spirited debate over the remote, and a coughing fit that nearly sent Melrose into hysterics before Cascabella came back with a glass of water.

When Carolina got home, though, 'babysitter' mode deactivated, which was probably why nobody noticed Pasilla determinedly scaling the bookshelf until it began to wobble. Melrose had noticed first and, as she was wont to do, shrieked, attracting her siblings' full attention.

Cascabella's gasp and Lewis's hoarse yelp were both eclipsed by the crash of books falling to the ground and glass breaking.

But the shelf, beyond all reason, stayed upright, floating a solid foot off the air with Pasilla clinging to it for dear life.

When Carolina came thundering in, the trio of children had cautiously inched closer to the spectacle; Melrose had craned up to get their youngest sister down and then, automatically, handed her off to Lewis while Cassie called for their mother.

The bookshelf continued to hang in the air.

The Pepper matriarch didn't notice right away, busy inspecting her kids for injury and _for goodness sake, Lewis, 'rest' does not mean 'carry Cece around like a doll', give her here before you collapse._

She started violently when the sight registered and, without a trace of hesitation, stepped between it and her children. Both Melrose and Cascabella tried to peek around their mother's form, eager to get a look at the hovering furniture now that their safety had been assured, but Pasilla-- still shaken from her brush with gravity-- keened and threw her arms around Lewis.

At that point, several things happened in rapid succession.

Lewis, unprepared for Pasilla's assault, stumbled backwards-- saved from the floor only because he'd run into the arm of the couch first-- and inhaled sharply. The coughing fit that followed wasn't a surprise, but the shelf's sudden adherence to the laws of physics _was_. Melrose, true to form, squawked and backpedalled, pinwheeling her arms, while Carolina suspiciously toed at the jumble of shattered trinkets and wood.

In the middle of it all, Cassie strode back through the living room, grabbed the abandoned cup, and pressed it into her brother's hand. It shook at he accepted it, his frame still shuddering as he gasped for air, but not so much that the remaining water slopped over the edges.

"I-- I--" A dull ache throbbed at his temples, and, though the pressure should have hurt, it hardly fazed him. Even so, he clenched his eyes shut, hoping to make it go away.

Carolina must have mistaken the staggered speech as a plea for help, because she'd crossed the room in an instant and knelt down, murmuring parental platitudes. It would have been comforting, if not for the feeling of _badbadbad_ that only got stronger as the headache burned behind his closed eyes.

Midway through 'Don't drink too fast, you'll choke', he couldn't take it and blurted, "I'm sorry!"

Eyes still shut tight, he didn’t see the way Carolina's features twisted in concern-- and undeniable confusion. Truth be told, he wasn't entirely sure why he was apologizing, or where the rest of it came from.

"I-- Cece was going to fall a-and I panicked! I didn't-- I didn't mean to."

He heard movement, but didn't see what was going on, and that only scared him worse-- but the budding hysteria was cut short as a cool hand rested itself against his forehead. It was clumsy, fingers were splayed out, brushing against the bridge of his nose, and the hand itself was too small to be anyone's but Pasilla's.

Without giving it any more thought, he withdrew, sliding down against the couch onto the floor pressing his hands to his face. Cece seemed to give the matter the same amount of attention before clambering onto his lap.

For the second time that afternoon, Carolina had to physically remove Cece from Lewis's person. After the girl had been draped over Melrose, Mrs. Pepper gently took both of her adoptive son's hands in her own and coaxed him into looking at her.

"Sweetie, you're sick. Now I'm not saying you're seeing things-- if so, we're _all_ delusional-- but you _are_ seeing blame where it doesn't belong."

Her smile didn't get an answer, but she didn't let it dissuade her as she straightened up and took control of the situation.

"Alright, everyone clear out of the living room. There's no way I can get this _all_ cleaned up before I need to be back at the Paradiso, and I don't want anybody getting hurt on the glass. Promise me you won't go messing around in here." Though none of them were inclined to try it, the kids knew it wasn't up for debate. "Mel, head back to your sisters' room and keep Cece out of any more trouble, okay? Cassie, go unpack the bag I brought home-- and Lewis, at least _try_ to get some more rest. You're never going to shake that bug of yours if you keep this up. Everyone know what they're doing?"

There was a quiet chorus of "Yes, mama." before the quartet disbanded in various directions.

With a brief moment to herself, Carolina took a measured breath and felt her nails scrape against the blue plastic cup she'd been gripping for the past few minutes. Logically, it should have toppled to the floor when Lewis had started to break down, and she'd made to snatch it out of the air before it hit the ground.

But, like the bookcase before it, gravity simply ceased to exist in regards to the cup-- until Carolina grabbed it herself, at least.

She forced her hands to relax and, as she skirted the disaster her living room had become, stared the shelf down like the entire fiasco had been its doing. Though she wouldn't let her composure falter, she couldn't help the hushed question that fell from her lips.

"Oh, sweetheart, is _this_ why…?"


	5. Chapter 5

The Ebner facility's upper floor was much less exciting than the lower path.

There was a large hole blown out of the building's side, which Arthur and Lewis observed from a reasonable distance. They looked from it to one another and, simultaneously, decided to go on as though they hadn't seen it.

If they didn't approach the drop, nobody had to say anything.

Nothing else stuck out in the connected rooms. They were dirty-- dust, dirt and garbage liberally coating the floor and walls-- and, secretly, Lewis was thankful for the ability to hover above the worst of it, but that was the most that could be said about them.

His instincts still screamed at him to grab the others and _get out_ , but he tamped down on the feeling.

For what might have been the third time since heading upstairs, he reminded himself that Mystery hadn't felt anything wrong here, and seemed comfortable letting them have full rein of the place. It was a cold comfort after what had happened last time, but, as Vivi had so helpfully pointed out, he couldn't die again. He just had to watch out for the two humans who _could_.

Something crashed downstairs and, despite the fact that he was hanging a good three inches in the air, Lewis jumped, nerves eating further at his resolve. Before he could consciously issue the command, a Deadbeat extracted itself from his core and dipped down through the floorboards.

When it returned, it brought with it a mental image. A heap of rotten wood on the floor, Vivi standing over it with an arched brow, the underlying buzz of s _afesafesafe._

Lewis nodded to it and offered a hand in thanks; it bumped up against it and gave a high trill before retreating back to his core. He turned to convey the message, only to find Arthur watching him, trying to hide a smile.

"…what?"

"You and your pets."

He sighed. This again. "They're not pets."

"Uh huh. That's why you're always _petting_ them, right?"

Sensing that the issue wasn't about to drop-- especially when Arthur had a solid point to work from-- he turned his attention to a pile of junk in the corner, acting like there was something interesting about it. "They like it."

"So does Galahad, and you know Mystery can't turn down a good scratch behind the ear. If _he's_ someone's pet, your little ghostly backup singers are _definitely_ your pets."

"They're not my pets." Lewis repeated, focusing on a piece of card paper sticking out of the mess. "They're-- it's not-- ugh. Can't you tease me about something _else_ for once?"

As he reached over to investigate, he saw Arthur shrug out of the corner of his vision. "If you insist."

The blonde waited until he'd tugged the paper free before saying, "What happened to that hypochondria of yours?"

The smirk he had to be wearing was practically _audible_.

Lewis rolled his eyes, but still sent a wave of intangibility through it, allowing the grime to slough off.

Arthur snorted. "There it is."

"You done?"

There was a beat of silence as Arthur seemed to consider his answer. "Yeah, I'm good. Whatcha got?"

 Wordlessly, Lewis handed it over.

"This is a card with a square on it." Frowning, he turned it over and squinted at the generic design that covered the back. "Must make for the worst game of hearts ever. Why pick it up?"

Honestly, Lewis hadn't really thought about the 'why'-- but, by the same stroke, he hadn't just wanted to reach over and grab a piece of trash. Why _had_ he picked it up?

He shrugged.

"Aaaaand now you're rooting through the garbage without a reason. Can we just get out of here? It's starting to creep me out, and we haven't even found anything weird yet."

Again, Lewis shrugged. "Me too. Let's make sure all Vivi found is a collapsing bookshelf and leave."

Arthur gave a short bark of laughter and started towards the door, idly flipping the card between his prosthetic fingers. "I mean, you were weirded out before we even got here, but yeah. Is that what the crash was?"

Lewis hummed in confirmation, took to the air again, and phased through the wall to keep the metaphorical stride. As they passed through the room with a hole in its side, though, his pace slowed and, cautiously, he drifted towards it.

In the next doorway to the stairs, Arthur stopped and turned back to him, fingers curling around the door jam. "Lew?"

"This was burned." Eye sockets narrowed in contemplation, he looked back around the room for any signs of a fire and came up empty. Biting back the unease that came with any significant height, he gripped at the wall's edge and peered around it. Curiosity sated, he put a comfortable amount of distance between himself and the hole. "But it's not burnt outside."

"And it doesn't look like there was a fire in here." Arthur said for him, leaning against the empty doorway with his good arm propped up against the wood. In his prosthetic, the card stilled.

"Except for that. Knock it off, man."

Lewis followed the pointed look down to his own hand, unconsciously cradled to hold a flickering pink flame. He shook it, dispelling the fire.

"Don't s'pose there's a reason you just did that?"

Lewis looked back to the charred wall and, quietly, said, "No."

When he next looked to Arthur, the blonde had crossed the room and was half a second away from grabbing his arm.

"C'mon, we're gettin' outta here." With that, Arthur hooked his own arm around Lewis' and toted the ghost behind him. Lewis didn't complain, but he didn't say anything else, either. Paranoia still pinged at him, growing increasingly difficult to ignore.

When they reached the promised pile of wood, they realized why they hadn't heard any further crashes.

A sliding door was built into the wall, virtually indistinguishable from the rest of it, and had been jammed out of its tracks, rendering it incapable of shutting. Curious, Arthur stepped forward to inspect it more closely.

The arm he'd been towing Lewis by stopped him, the ghost's opposite hand wrapped around his wrist.

He stopped and turned around, suddenly very worried.

"We shouldn't go down there." Lewis said, urgency coloring his tone, "It's not-- it's--"

Mechanical arm raised in surrender, Arthur half-turned to address his friend face-to-face; he wasn't entirely surprised to find that the anxious demeanor had returned full-force, contrasting strangely against the skeletal projection. "Hey, you don't have to explain to me. Not like I actually _want_ to go down into the creepy secret passageway."

 He frowned and sighed through his nose as something occurred to him: they might not have been itching to investigate the cryptic stairway, but Vivi would. Without thinking about it, he turned around and took a step towards the hidden panel.

Again, he was tugged back-- this time with more force than was strictly necessary, sending him stumbling in reverse until he landed against Lewis's chest. Both of the ghost's arms wrapped firmly around him, fixing him in place so he couldn't try it again.

" _No_." It was more of a plea than a command, and the way his friend's voice trembled sent a pang through Arthur's heart. "You _can't_."

Arthur forced himself to laugh. "Sorry, wasn't thinking. Trust me, I have absolutely _zero_ intention of wandering down there; I just wanted to see if that's where Vivi and Mystery disappeared to."

A silence met this explanation and, for a second, he worried that he'd said something wrong. Then Lewis loosened his hold and cautiously made his way around Arthur; at no point did he lose contact, and, when he angled himself between Arthur and the passageway, there was still one large hand pressed against the blonde's chest.

"Yeah-- yeah, I understand. I'll take care of it."

"Hey," Craning forward, Arthur tried to tug at Lewis's collar to get his attention, but couldn't reach. As a compromise, he poked at the ghost's back, between the bony protrusions of his suit. "Honestly, I was just gonna holler down. Seemed safer and easier than anything else."

Even from behind, Lewis's relief was palpable. "Ah. Okay. That's a better idea."

This time, when Arthur neared the entryway, he wasn't met with any resistance; he ducked under Lewis's arm and cupped one hand to his mouth as he yelled, "Hey Viv, you down there?"

The call echoed down into the darkness, where it was met with an answering shout.

"Yeah!"

After a beat of silence, Vivi added, "But don't follow us! We're coming right back up-- you guys stay up there!"

Arthur tensed at the note of panic reverberating up to them and, from where he was pressed up against the ghost's side, was keenly aware of the fact that Lewis was a hair's breadth from storming down there heedless of his own advice.

Then Mystery started growling. At that point, there wasn't anything that could have stopped Lewis.

Arthur spent about three seconds weighing the pros and cons of staying there versus following and, in the end, tossed both hands up before making the descent.


	6. Chapter 6

Vivi turned around to find that the trash heap had become sentient.

There were quite a few implications to consider there– and she was sure she’d be poring over it when she wasn’t actively doing fieldwork– but, for the time being, all she could think was that Mystery had been traipsing around _inside_ of a ghost. She took half a second to consider the look of abject _horror_ Lewis would give her at the thought, but it was hard to hold onto given the current circumstances.

_“Give—_ “ The rusted chairs creaked, _“—it—_ “ They were joined by an unearthly wheeze, and dust swirled around within the construct. The vocal surrogate was fascinating, but difficult to understand. Vivi only understood it because there was some kind of underlying mode of communication beneath the noises—almost like a translation from supernatural to human—that tipped her off.

All of that was rendered a moot point when a chorus of human voices joined those of the supposedly inanimate objects.

_“—BACK.”_

There was really only one thing that it could be referring to. She tapped her nails against the book’s still-dusty back cover and glanced at Mystery, who was tracking the orbit of what looked like an old, broken mug. A lot of help he was.

“This is yours?” She asked, stepping forward with the book held out in offering.

The whirlwind of garbage slowed ever so slightly with her approach, and settled into a sedate, gravity-defying pace when she finally came to a halt.

_“Ours.”_ It said.

The book rose out of her hands and jerked open, pages flipping past her glasses as though being thumbed through. Without any warning, it went back to following the laws of physics, and Vivi barely caught it before it could fall to the floor.

_“Missing.”_ The being said, almost sadly. Its amalgam of voices and groans—each recognizably an individual, but so perfectly in-sync as to be inhuman—faltered before it repeated itself. _“Still missing. Still incomplete.”_

Now _that_ Vivi could get behind.

“What’s missing? What do you need? Is that what’s keeping you tied here?”

A chiding—but fond—“ _Vivi_ ” brought her back before she could get too ahead of herself.

“Oh! Yeah, it would probably help if we knew who—or what—you are.”

There was a brief silence as it processed the request.

_“Us.”_ It paused and a length of frayed cord waved lazily towards the cul-de-sac of offshoot rooms. _“Them.”_ The cord went limp and a moldy blanket picked up the slack, gesturing past Vivi and Mystery, towards the secret door. _“Them.”_

It, too, slumped to the floor and was sucked back into the conglomerate of garbage.

_“Incomplete.”_

Vivi’s brow furrowed. “Wait, are you incomplete or is it the book? What are you missing? How can we help you?”

Slowly, it repeated, _“Help_ ”. The word seemed to strike a chord with it, because it repeated it several times, tone shifting with each repetition. When it began to slow down, it was almost jubilant.

_“We help. Helped.”_

“Who did you help? How?”

_“Helped. Leave.”_ In the gloom, a lick of fire flared to life and quickly died out.

Belatedly, Vivi realized that accounted for flying objects, ghostly lights and supernatural noises—each of which featured in the stories about the Ebner Facility. Though she hardly needed any further confirmation that this being was at the center of the local legends, it was a nice to have hard evidence.

It didn’t want people in its territory, Vivi assumed. That would explain the wards and the disgusting feeling they gave off; it wanted to keep people away and to ‘help’ them by doing so. So then why was it talking to her instead of trying to drive her off?

A chalkboard on one of the far doors rattled.

One of Mystery’s ears flattened, but the other remained perked as he cocked his head.

_“Helped Fourteen leave.”_

For half a second, Vivi thought it meant the number of people who had invaded the premises—but then the number clicked. “’Fourteen’ as in that dusty room? I… don’t get it. Sorry.”

_“Us. We are. One, Two, Three…”_ The cord came to life again, pointing at one of the doors, then another, and another. After it counted off nine, it stopped indicating to the doors in order, doubling up on numbers in seemingly random directions. It halted before listing fourteen, paused, and then utilized the blanket one more time, pointing up the hallway, _“Mark, Derek, Ivan…”_

To be honest, Vivi had been so excited by contact with the spirit that its appearance and voice hadn’t made much of a difference to her for the time being. She hadn’t considered far beyond the fact that it referred to itself as “we”, but now it was making a frightening amount of sense.

“A-ah. What happened to, uh, make you _you_?”

The blanket flopped back to the ground, closer than it had before, and Vivi automatically jumped away from it, landing closer to Mystery and startling him back to attention.

There was a long silence and she was convinced that the apparition wasn’t going to respond when it finally said, _“Died._ ”

Vivi almost laughed at the simplicity of the statement. Mystery bristled and preemptively set one paw ahead of her, between the two parties.

_“But stayed. Couldn’t leave us behind, but couldn’t help. Incomplete. Saved him.”_ As an afterthought, it offered the same list of names as before. _“Became part of us. Still not complete.”_

While she couldn’t totally stifle her innate curiosity, Vivi felt that was enough information to get the general idea what was going on. The ghost manifesting through refuse was made up of the spiritual bits and pieces of people who had died here—people connected to the rooms—and it had ‘added’ to itself at some point in time. That was enough for Vivi to decide that it was going to take more than their sightseeing fieldtrip to solve this. They needed to be prepared in order to do anything about this being—or, at the very least, not scattered across the premises.

As if on cue, a shout rang down the basement hallway, “Hey Viv, you down there?”

Automatically, she hollered back, “Yeah!”

On one hand, that meant that the proverbial reinforcements were here, but, on the other, everyone being in the same place didn’t mean they were any more prepared than before.

Hastily, she amended, “But don’t follow us! We’re coming right back up—you guys stay there!”

The blanket writhed on the floor, twisting the way Vivi would use towels as whips, and stretched taut, as far down the hall as it could go without severing its connection to the garbage epicenter.

Even as she backed up several paces, mindful not to fall victim to the moldy tripwire, Vivi found herself asking, “ _What_ are you doing?”

The ghost didn’t answer. Mystery bit back a warning growl, then went ahead and did it anyway.

There was a commotion from behind them—someone running down the basement stairs, a squawk, Arthur sputtering, then simply, “Dude, not cool.”

She turned in time to see Arthur pick himself up off the ground and dust his pants off—frowning at a bit of debris he had to pull off specifically—before going on, “If you’re gonna make the dramatic exit, you gotta follow through. Or at least go intangible so I run through you instead of _into_ _you_.”

Lewis, for his part, was not paying a bit of attention.

He was focused on the rotting blanket– which was fair– but not in the usual ‘oh god keep that thing away from me’ way, in spite of the disgust on his skull. That was a good thing, too, because the blanket seemed intent on doing anything _but_ staying away from him.

Vivi cringed. Whatever— _whoever_ —this ghost was, it was a composite of multiple people’s spiritual imprints. It had virtually told her that it had killed people and still not found the ‘completion’ it was looking for—she didn’t want to know what it might try in the presence of a foreign spirit.

With a raised brow and a tight frown, she stepped on the blanket-tentacle’s midsection to pin it.

It gave a pathetic wiggle at its end, but didn’t do much else.

Vivi turned back to Lewis, intending to gauge his expression—skeletal projection be damned.

What she got was puzzling.

Lewis had followed the tendril to its source, spent what seemed like half a second on the ghost’s main body, and then stared _through_ it. He still looked grossed out, which was a comforting constant, but it wasn’t quite the response she’d been expecting.

Where Lewis’s reaction left something to be desired, Arthur provided.

“Uhh, can I ask why we’re staring at a trash tornado?” He paused, “And what this place even _is_? Preferably answered in that order, but I guess I don’t have a whole lot of room here…”

“You can certainly ask.” Mystery said, still angled between Vivi and the garbage in question. “But I can’t promise you any answers at this point in time.”

“Thanks.” Arthur said flatly.

He probably would have had some smart comment to offer in addition to that, but it was around then that Lewis snapped out of his daze and stepped forward, matching Mystery in positioning. The amorphous vortex slowed to a halt.

Beneath Vivi’s shoe, the tendril writhed a few more times before giving up.

For a moment, it was almost like the two spirits were staring each other down—or sizing each other up– in spite of the nameless ghost’s lack of facial features. Or any features in general.

Eventually, Lewis lowered his guard just enough to offer a brittle, “Well. The property isn’t cursed.”

To which Arthur rolled his eyes and muttered, “Good observation– cursed, no. Haunted, yes.”

The trash pile quivered.

_“Safe?”_

Arthur blanched. “It _talks_?”

Unsympathetically, Vivi gave a short, “Yeah.”

“Why is the garbage talking to us? What _is_ it?”

_“Safe?”_

Though he’d gone unnoticed before, Lewis had taken half a step backwards as the entity spoke. With its second outburst, he did so again and then shook his head vigorously.

“Collective consciousness.”

When that failed to get any response other than silent, questioning stares, he faltered, “That’s… what it is. A collective consciousness. If you listen, you can hear…” He trailed off there, though whether it was due to embarrassment or something else, nobody could be quite certain. Given the truly baffling expression playing over his skull—eye sockets narrowed unpleasantly—it could have been just about anything. Anything that wasn’t good news for them, at least.

The debris making up the consciousness’s form went swirling by at a furious pace, but only made one circuit before coming to a screeching halt. _“Died.”_

_“Not… safe?”_

There was an absolute silence up until…

_“You came back.”_

And the basement exploded into sound.


End file.
